Thinking
by Laura909
Summary: Both Hermione and Snape think too much, where will it get them?  They somehow got themselves invested in a project that may save a life or two.
1. Chapter 1

Alright, this story is starts during Hermione's sixth year, not sure where it will end. I made a small change and had Snape teach potions instead of Slughorn.

I don't own Harry Potter.

Professor Severus Snape was patrolling the corridors as usual when he heard somebody coming towards him. For some reason he decided to step back in the shadows to wait for the culprit to appear.

Sure enough it was a student out of bed roaming the halls in the middle of the night. He was going to give her detention and send her back to bed, when he saw the extraordinarily happy expression on her face. Granted it wasn't that unusual, she was a generally happy person, but this expression was different.

That wasn't the only thing peculiar; she was walking confidently down the corridor in the middle of the night, when most students would have been sneaking about, or running for it. In fact most students would not have come to this corridor at all, that's why he liked to patrol there the most.

She kept on walking while he watched and waited, thinking about the strangeness of the situation, and when he realized he should probably do something about her breaking school rules, she was gone.

The next morning in the great hall, Snape was still wondering what exactly happened last night? Why didn't he give her a detention? Why did this occurrence seem so strange?

While he was brooding about his actions the previous night, she walks in with Potter and Weasley. She looked tired, but she should be after gallivanting about the castle in the middle of the night.

_Stop obsessing about this, it really doesn't matter._

He stared at his plate and tried to think about potions, Voldemort, or anything else while he finished his breakfast. Although he tried to deny it, he did glance, inconspicuously, in her direction a time or two.

Hermione woke up late, but hurried through her morning ritual, and managed to meet Harry and Ron in the common room before they left for breakfast.

Last night she chanced a walk about the castle, so she could think. She usually liked to walk alone and think about this or that when something was troubling her. She had a path all worked out in an area that not a lot of students visited, so she wouldn't run into anyone snogging.

She shouldn't have went without borrowing Harry's cloak like usual, but her walk was a last minute decision, so she figured she would just go for a short walk without it.

Hermione made it to her usual location without any trouble, but after walking for a while she came to this one corridor and she got a strange feeling. She kept walking, figuring that if it was trouble she really couldn't avoid it now. She never saw anything unusual, but had a distinct feeling that she was not alone.

She decided to play it cool, like she didn't notice anything, and kept walking, hoping that whatever it was that was also in the corridor didn't care or notice.

Once she got around the corner, she flew back to her room, but couldn't fall asleep for thinking about what happened.

At breakfast, she felt like someone was watching her, but didn't want to alert Harry and Ron, so she just ignored it, but glanced at the other tables looking for who it was and not finding them.

"Come on Harry, Ron, we'll be late for potions."

"Gee Hermione, we've got loads of time, see, Snape hasn't even left yet."

'Fine Ron, I'll just meet you there then."

Truth be told, she just wanted to get out of there, it just felt awkward the whole time.

_I might as well just go to potions even though it doesn't start for another thirty minutes. I can review the chapter again before class starts. _

Snape walked into the potions classroom and Hermione was already there.

"Ten points from Gryffindor for not preparing before class Ms. Granger."

She was going to say that she had already read the chapter five times, but realized when he sat down at his desk and looked at her daring her to say something, that there was that same awkwardness as at breakfast. Quickly searching for a reason for the awkwardness, she went through the past few days and came to a shocking conclusion. It was Professor Snape that she passed in the corridor last night. _How had she escaped detention?_ Oh well she thought, clearly she was going to pay for it, the ten points were proof. Somehow she figured that it was not over, not in the slightest.

She went back to reading, and he started marking papers, and not soon enough, Harry, Ron, and Neville came in and sat down next to her.

Class went as usual, Hermione helped Neville with his potion, but somehow he still managed to melt his cauldron.

**Please, Please review and tell me what you think about this, I haven't posted any writing before, and would appreciate any feedback. **


	2. Chapter 2

It was late. Snape had just come from a meeting with Dumbledore. The old fool had gone and made a huge mistake in his excitement to end the war. In trying to destroy the horcrux that he found, he also succeeded in ensuring his own death would come within the year. Granted I was able to slow it for now, but the curse would eventually kill him unless he found another way.

Of course he didn't mention this to Dumbledore yet, he wanted to do some research first and find out if there was any support for his idea (Idea, what Idea he really had no clue what he was going to do) before he told Albus about his plans, best not to get his hopes up for nothing, and he didn't want anybody to know if he failed.

So Snape set to work looking through his private library for anything that might lead to any real ideas.

After several days of searching through his own books, he decided that he needed more items to search. He made the trip to the library and was browsing through the aisles and he saw that Granger was sitting at her usual table in the back where it was quieter.

Pretending not to notice, although he clearly did, he kept browsing, and when he selected a few, he checked them out and headed back to the dungeons to read.

Every time he returned to the library, she always seemed to be sitting at that same table (although he clearly didn't notice).

Hermione had been rather preoccupied the past few days. Being rather more observant than others (particularly Ron) she had noticed that there was something wrong with Professor Dumbledore's hand and assumed it would heal in time, but so far it hadn't, in fact it might even be worse now. She knew that it must be something serious to cause an injury that couldn't be immediately healed in the wizarding world, perhaps a dark curse of some sort.

It seemed to just keep coming up. Harry didn't seem to think much of it, and Ron was oblivious as ever, so she decided to do some research and figure this out. She had always prided herself on her sense of curiosity, but it had gotten her into trouble before, so she would be careful.

She knew that Harry was busy trying to figure out Voldemort, so she decided to keep her curiosity to herself, at least for now. Who knows, it may not be anything important after all.

She started off looking through healing texts, but figured it was a waste of time, sine Dumbledore could easily have fixed anything mentioned in them. Next she thought about spells, this must be a powerful curse.

Now she had something in mind, granted that it is quite a broad subject, she set out to find some books to consult. She picked out some interesting texts and headed back to her table for a few hours of research.

The next day, Hermione headed back to the library, since she had found absolutely nothing yesterday. She picked out some new books, and headed back to her table, but when she got there she realized that Professor Snape was already sitting there.

Hes in my spot, why is he in my spot?

She looked at the situation more closely and realized that one of the books on the table might just be what she needed.

She walked over to the table, "Um, sorry Sir, um, may I borrow that book for a moment?"

He looks up and glared at her until she felt she had to explain, "I just wanted to get the authors name so I could look it up later."

Snape, "I don't think so," before returning to his book.

"Why Sir?"

"Because Granger, this is from the restricted section, and you wouldn't have access to it anyway."

"Oh, sorry Sir, but might I get the information in the event that I do obtain permission to read it?"

More annoyed now, "Granger, will you leave me to my reading and quit pestering me with your endless questions. The answer is no, if by chance you do get permission to read this book, you may come ask me for the information."

Hermione stood there glaring right back at him, then decided it wasn't worth it, so she turned around and walked away, sighing loudly.

"10 points from Gryffindor for unnecessary noise in the library," then he returned to reading the same sentence for the eighth time.

_Why did I just do that, it wasn't against the rules to allow a student to know the author of the book. I don't know, and neither do I want to know. Oh, the possibilities just make me sick. Either I really dislike her, or I find her interesting and am trying to get an interesting response, or…I don't want to know. _

_It was funny that when she noticed I stole her table, she just stood there looking…a lot like Ron Weasley actually. _

Hermione just checked out her books and headed back to the common room to think. _Why did Snape have to be so aggravating? I think he wanted me to tell him off, or at least I wanted too. _

_Maybe I'm just mad because he stole my table and everyone knows that is my table. I've seen him in the library looking at me enough to know that he knows it's my table. _

_He did it on purpose. That Slytherin, fine, he can have the table I don't care. Nope, I do care. Next time I will beat him to it. _


	3. Chapter 3

Wow, it has been a long time since I have worked on this story. This chapter is new, but I changed some things in the other chapters as well since they didn't seem to make seen and sounded a little creepy. Well anyways, I hope whoever reads this enjoys it.

Later that night, Hermione was searching through the new books when she suddenly just sighed in frustration and put them away, honestly she wanted to throw them, but the Madame Pince wouldn't let her near the library again if she hurt her books. Although she tried to deny it, she also felt protective of her books as well.

Leaving the common room, she started on that same path she walked when she needed to think.

_It's really no use. I could search the whole library and not find anything remotely useful. Obviously if Dumbledore couldn't figure it out, she sure wasn't going to be able to by just searching the books that the school allowed the students to use. I need to get permission to go into the restricted section to search. _

_I can't ask McGonagall, she will think I am looking for trouble. Sprout, Binns, and Trelawney were out of the question too, as she couldn't think of a possible excuse to gain permission. I couldn't imagine asking Flitwick, so that leaves Snape. _

She didn't really have a plan for getting his permission, but it might be possible to come up with a not so obvious question that didn't involving dark magic. Who was she kidding that was a lame idea and he would see right through it.

She was feeling pretty brave, so instead went on a search for Snape, knowing full well that he would be in the dungeons, probably just releasing a poor first year from detention.

There were no students in the halls on the way to the dungeons She proceeded to the classroom and knocked on the door, no answer, so she proceeded to his office and knocked still trying to come up with a plan that would work.

"Enter" he called impatiently from his office

She opened the door and stepped inside, "Professor, I was um wondering if I could possibly do an extra credit assignment to um make up for my work on my last assignment."

It almost killed her to beg for extra credit when she knew that she actually deserved full credit in the first place, but sacrifices had to be made, for she was determined now.

"Granger, I do not enjoy grading extra work, and while you may think your work flawless, it most defiantly is not. Therefore I will only grant extra credit for a very well researched, well planned essay. You may attempt such, but if I do not see it as worthy you efforts will have been for naught because I am most certainly not going to correct misspelled words and such. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes Sir."

Snape turned back to his work while she just stood there. After a few moments, he added"If you have nothing else to say please feel free to leave."

Turning to leave, Hermione realized she had no criteria for the assignment, so she asked, "Oh, I don't think you have told me the requirements for this essay yet."

He looked up, "A topic of your own choosing, just make it worthwhile."

"How long should it be sir?"

Smiling to himself he answered, "Write as much as you feel is necessary."

She knew with this he was just trying to make her unsure, but it didn't really matter right now anyway, she really just wanted to browse the restricted section and this was a perfect opportunity if she could think of a topic to suite.

Hermione turned and left his office, going back to the common room to think up an acceptable topic.

Shape, needless to say was very happy with himself for making the task so difficult. Generally he did allow extra credit if students asked without too much of a fuss, but he had a feeling that there was an ulterior motive behind her actions. Although he wasn't sure what it was yet, he knew he would find out eventually.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated, thanks for reading.


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